Advent

When there’s so much bad news in the world, it’s easy to become numb to it all.
Somehow, my own suffering increases my sensitivity again to others’ pain. Suffering breaks through our defences and causes us to long for God’s intervention. My heart cries out to God. Our world still needs the healing that only God can give.
I have met those whose diagnosis was similar to mine and now, just months later, they have secondary cancer in spine, bones, liver. I don’t have answers for them. I do know that many people walk in great darkness, but that there is a light, and it is very bright.
For all who are suffering, it is a time to wait on God, to trust God even when things aren’t going the way we think they should be. It’s a time to remember God’s goodness, and to confess that, no matter what, our good and gracious God will always “work all things together for good” (Romans 8:28).

Thus we have hope, ultimate hope, aching hope, confident hope in God.
And this is the heart of Advent.